Feeling under the gun? That's understandable. After all, the
onus is on you to restore investor confidence.

Some companies are considering doing more than just meet insider
trading requirements to overcome investor distrust. While the SEC
now demands companies inform investors of insider sales of company
stock within two days after a sale, Charles Schwab Corp. may
require senior executives to announce intentions prior to the
sale-a move investors would appreciate, says Peter Knutson,
associate professor emeritus of accounting at the University of
Pennsylvania's Wharton School in Philadelphia. "When
people on the inside are buying and selling, it's a strong
signal of how they're valuing shares."

Other firms are seeking ways to spread the responsibility of
meeting the requirements. Some have addressed the new rule that
CEOs must certify financial reports by asking senior executives to
sign off on numbers first. Knutson notes the action reflects
CEOs' awareness that the rule is unreasonable.
"There's no way CEOs can know the [reports] are faultless.
They're being asked to certify beyond what auditors certify,
and auditors send in trained people to do that."

Once heralded as the remedy for an ailing social security
system, 401(k) plans are losing their luster in today's
topsy-turvy stock market. It's about time people took a closer
look at these programs, contends Matthew D. Hutcheson, president of
MDH Consulting Inc. in Portland, Oregon, who notes that the
pressure of developing a retirement portfolio has long been a
source of frustration and anxiety for many employees. "The
401(k) industry has been serving up a platter of financial junk
food to America's workers," Hutcheson asserts.
"Analysts spend months [examining] different mutual funds
before selecting one, yet we go into a meeting and tell
participants they have to select their mutual funds in 30
minutes."

Employers looking for a different retirement program for their
workers-and themselves-may want to consider adopting a modified
program dubbed a "targeted 401(k)," under which variables
such as elected deferral, employer matching and profit sharing are
optimally determined and redetermined year-to-year to target a
specific level of future retirement income.

"A targeted 401(k) takes the burden of choosing investments
off of the employee and places it with a professional
manager," says Hutcheson, "and enables employees to
continually evaluate their retirement portfolio and make
adjustments to what they can control-their contribution levels-to
ensure that they hit their retirement target." To find out
more , log on to www.401khelpcenter.com or www.benefitnews.com.

Retire and Acquire

Is the stock market getting you-and your retirement
savings-down? Maybe it's time to consider a little-known
retirement alternative: the real-estate IRA. "The bottom
doesn't generally fall out of the real estate investment as it
may with certain other investments in the stock market," says
Tom Anderson, CEO of Portsmouth, New Hampshire-based Pensco Trust
Co., who notes that many people don't realize they can
diversify by rolling retirement funds into a self-directed IRA and
then investing in real estate.

How does it work? "It's like any other real estate
investment," Anderson explains. "You open an IRA, [take
money out of it], find a property you want to invest it in, and go
through the closing and registration process." As with any IRA
investment, you can sell at any point and incur no taxes on the
gains as long as you don't withdraw the fund before age 591/2 .
What's more,you can also use your IRA funds to purchase
retirement property and then take ownership of it at age 591/2 as a
tax-free IRA distribution.

But there's also plenty you can't do. "You have to
work with someone who is knowledgeable to avoid setting up a
prohibitive transaction," Anderson cautions. For example,
while any type of property likely to appreciate in value (such as
land, rental property or a commercial building) is fair game, you
cannot use IRA funds to purchase a property that you, your spouse,
children or parents will live in.

Family Matters

Family-owned businesses are often said to be the backbone of the
American economy. So why is it so hard for them to find venture
capital? "There's an enormous bias and prejudice among the
venture community against family-owned businesses," explains
Mark Greenough, president of San Mateo, California-based Greenough
Consulting Group. "VCs tend to want control over who will be
on the management team, and that's more difficult when there
are relationship ties in addition to business interests."

Anticipation of an exit strategy conflict is another concern,
adds Stephen Sammut, a venture partner at San Francisco-based
private merchant bank Burrill & Co. "It's generally
assumed that the family is not seeking to exit the deal the way a
VC would and that even if the firm were to go public, it would
remain a tightly controlled corporation with the family owning the
majority of shares. So there's a dissonance between the VC
model and the family ownership model."

To placate potential investors, Sammut suggests that family
business owners offer written reassurance of the principals'
commitment to the goals and exit strategy-or look elsewhere for a
capital infusion. "Concessions may have to be made, with
management agreeing to surrender control or decision-making
authority regarding relatives who are employees," he says.
"While venture capital is worth exploring, family businesses
may find their efforts more productive with other sources of
capital, such as angel investors and bank loans."

Jennifer Pellet is a
New York City-based freelance writer specializing in business and
finance.